Are We There Yet?
by ChibiCori
Summary: A fic challenge from Kurisutaru on the Sailor Moon Romantic FanFiction mailing list. In it, the girls go on a road trip in the U.S., hilarity ensues.


Are We There Yet?  
  
Fic Challenge Response  
  
Author: ChibiCori  
  
e-mail: kamikaze_bunny_eater@yahoo.com  
  
website: chibicori.virtue.nu  
  
rating: Hopefully, a reader-friendly PG!  
  
Disclaimer: Naoko owns Sailormoon. Cori owns only her voodoo shrine   
  
where she prays daily that she could be Naoko. See where I come up   
  
lacking?  
  
Wow...I actually did a fic challenge. Not that I have anything against them, I just never thought I would actually ever get an idea from some of the suggestions. Hopefully, I'll live up to some of the faboo fic challenges that have been issued before.  
  
Kuris-chan sent out this one. Keep an eye out for the following;  
  
1. sherbert  
  
2. fairies  
  
3. yo-yo  
  
4. tissue box  
  
5. clarinet  
  
6. "Barney" pillow  
  
7. Red Toyota Mini Van  
  
8. Mug Full of Ovaltine  
  
9. 10% off Kentucky Fried Chicken  
  
10. a blue toothbrush  
  
Don't look at me, Kuris-chan made that up.  
  
Are We There Yet?  
  
Rei clutched the steering wheel with a vice-like grip as a flash of red whizzed past her head. That had to be the umpteenth time, and it was getting old, fast.  
  
"Usagi?" Rei called to the back seat, her voice sticky-sweet as she glanced at her blonde friend through the rear view mirror.  
  
"Hmmm?" was Usagi's answer, her concentration plainly on the flick of her wrist as she cast her yo-yo out again.  
  
Rei bit back a growl as the plastic toy shot between the front seats of the red Toyota mini-van they had rented for their trek, then spoke through gritted teeth, "Do you mind?"  
  
Again, Usagi barely registered Rei's question as she flicked the yo-yo back to her, "Not at all."  
  
Rei's eyes flared and she just about leaped out of her seat to throttle Usagi when Ami put a calming hand on the priestess's shoulder, "Take it easy Rei, at least she isn't complaining about being bored."  
  
The dark-haired driver grumbled something about how little that made her feel better, then went back to concentrating on the road. After all, she was driving on the wrong side of the road, not to mention the wrong side of the car. America is such a backward place. She didn't even want to think about what these people did to the anime, it was nearly sacriligious.  
  
A lull in the world-dominating-queen-and-beast-department had convinced the senshi that now would be a good time to take a much needed rest. So there they were, stuffed into a van and driving through the U.S. They'd also agreed that it would be a "girls only" thing. Well, technically, the senshi had won that right with a vote of 4 to 1. Usagi would have to live without her precious Mamo-chan for a couple weeks.  
  
However, the trip came with a catch.  
  
"Are we there yet?"  
  
Makoto watched as Rei's shoulder's tensed up in her seat and quickly cast a look at the pink-haired, 10 year old squirming around in the very back seat, "We aren't much closer then the last time you asked, Chibi-Usa."  
  
"When was that?" bored cinnamon eyes stared out the window before falling back to Makoto.  
  
It was Minako who answered - well...actually, sneezed, "10 minutes ago."  
  
"Oh." Chibi-Usa blew out a little "pft" of air then shrugged back into her seat.  
  
"ACHOO!"  
  
"Bless you, Mina-chan." Ami glanced up from the map she was studying and smiled from her seat next to Rei.  
  
"Arigato." Minako responded, before grabbing a handful of tissues from a decorated box and blowing her nose loudly, "Gawd, whose idea was it to run through that fountain when it was 45 degrees out again?"  
  
Makoto cackled as she pointed to Usagi, who was still working at her yo-yo, "Who else?"  
  
Minako groaned and hugged the tissue box to her chest. Trying to ignore the stinging of her tissue-rawed nose, Minako let her head fall back heavily onto the pillow that her seatmate had lent her. She pried open a grimy eye and smiled slightly at Chibi-Usa, who was watching the scenery fly by, "Thank for letting me borrow your pillow."  
  
Chibi-Usa turned her head and grinned wide, "No problem, V-babe!"  
  
Minako winced at the reminder of the many traits the little girl was picking up from Usagi. She couldn't really complain though, after all, Usagi was Chibi-Usa's mother. She caught a flash of something purple through the corner of her eye and frowned again as she remembered it was simply that big...scary, purple thing that Chibi-Usa had begged them to buy at a store called K-Mart.  
  
"Who is this guy again?" Minako asked as she plumped it out under her tangled hair.  
  
"Barney!" Chibi-Usa giggled, which immediately required her to sing the "I Love You" song.  
  
"Oh right." Minako rolled her eyes and blew her nose roughly again, "Nothing like a Barney pillow to make a girl feel better."  
  
"At least she didn't get hooked on that other show we saw." Makoto commented, then furrowed her brow in thought, "What was it called again?"  
  
"Teletubbies." Usagi suddenly answered, again casting her yo-yo out, and again failing to notice Rei jerking violently in her seat.  
  
Makoto shuddered, then winked coyly at Minako, "You know, I heard the most interesting rumor about the purple one-"  
  
"Tinky Winky." Usagi again barged in, trying throwing the yo-yo underhand this time around.  
  
"Yeah, that one. Some guy told me that he's, you know..." Makoto trailed off.  
  
Minako tilted her head to the side and ran her sleeve under her nose before asking, "You know...what?"  
  
"A fairy." Usagi finished for Makoto, then delighting as she finally mastered the "walking the dog" manuver.  
  
"Usagi!" Minako, Makoto and Ami exclaimed, harrying poor Rei. The van crossed into the oncoming traffic lane for a moment before Rei managed to straighten it. Usagi had finally come out of her yo-yo induced trance and looked at her friend through wide blue eyes.  
  
"What?"  
  
"The Telutubbies are fairies!" Chibi-Usa bounced out of her seat and hung her top half over Makoto and Usagi's bench seat, "I didn't know that!"  
  
Three pairs of eyes glared at Usagi, who simply shrugged and wound the string of her toy back up.  
  
"Chibi-Usa, why don't you sit back and relax a bit." Ami offered, checking her map quickly, "We'll be at a rest stop within a half hour and we can get something to eat."  
  
"Ooh," Makoto started, then tilted up a hip so she'd have better access to her pocket. After withdrawing a slip of paper, she inquired from Ami, "Does that map say what kind of restraunts are there, because I've got a coupon for 10% off Kentucky Fried Chicken."  
  
Ami's brow creased in confusion as she scanned her map, then flipped through a couple pages before turning back to the original, "Kentucky Fried...but we're in Ohio."  
  
Makoto sweatdropped and shook her head, brown ponytail flopping from one shoulder to another as she said, "I don't think that's what they meant, Ami."  
  
"Are we there yet?" This time it had been Usagi to ask.  
  
"No." Chibi-Usa answered, sticking her head between Minako and Usagi as she chastized her future mother, "And that was a very silly question since Ami just said that we still had a half hour before we got to the rest spot."  
  
Usagi narrowed her eyes at the rotten spore before sticking her tongue out dismissively, "Go find something to amuse yourself with."  
  
Chibi-Usa's own pink tongue darted back and she disappeared from Usagi's sight, replying, "Fine, I will."  
  
A long moment of silence permeated through the vehicle after that. Minako had closed her eyes and drooped back into the Barney pillow, her bright red nose dripping slightly. Makoto fiddled with her seat belt, then began to absent-mindedly fold and unfold the KFC coupon. Ami was studying her maps, probably still trying to figure out the aforementioned restraunt. A tick was steadily jumping on Rei's temple as she steered the unruly pack of pretty, sailor-suited, soldiers through the light traffic of the interstate highway. Usagi slipped her finger through the string loop of her yo-yo, preparing to slice it through the air again when the shrill screech of a poorly played clarinet disrupted the short lived peace. Everyone held on for dear life as Rei veered the van off the road, then jerked the wheel to the side to replace herself on the asphalt.  
  
That done, Usagi quickly unbuckled and threw herself over her seat, snatching the instrument away from Chibi-Usa's practicing hands, "What are you doing?!"  
  
Chibi-Usa looked up at Usagi, her face the epitome of innocense as she said, "You told me to amuse myself."  
  
Usagi glared, then conceded that, yes, she had said that, "Okay, let me be more clear. Amuse yourself very quietly."  
  
"What will you give me if I do?" Chibi-Usa's innocense went up in smoke as a devilish grin split her face.  
  
Apparently, Usagi had taught the girl too well, "I'll get you ice cream at the rest area."  
  
"Sherbert?"  
  
"Sure."  
  
"Two scoops?"  
  
"Don't push it." Usagi warned, and Chibi-Usa stuck her small hand out to shake on it. The agreement made, the un-godly clarinet was put back into it's case. Usagi mumbled softly to herself about the downfalls of letting her join that music class before they left and began to scan the van's interior for her discarded yo-yo.  
  
"Usagi?" Chibi-Usa's small, pleading voice asked.  
  
"Hmmm?"  
  
"I'm hungry."  
  
Usagi rolled her eyes, then stilled as her own stomach began to rumble angrily. She straightened in her seat and looked at Makoto with a gaze as equally pleading as Chibi-Usa's. This time it was Makoto's turn to roll her eyes as she reached into her bag, "I think I may have a thermos of chocolate milk in here. But that'll have to tide you over until the rest stop."  
  
Both Chibi-Usa and Usagi's eyes lit up with joy at the prospect of creamy, chocolatey milk. Ami tittered softly before telling them, "You two are going to rot your teeth out with all the sweets you eat. Thank goodness I reminded you two to pack your toothbrushes."  
  
Both girls froze, then stuck coy hands behind their heads, "Heh, Ami..." Usagi trailed off.  
  
The blue-haired genuis arched a brow, "What?"  
  
Chibi-Usa looked down in embarrassment as Usagi continued, blushing bright red, "We kinda...er, lost our toothbrushes down the drain in our hotel last night."  
  
"You lost your toothbrushes?" Ami sputtered, "How did you manage that?"  
  
"We don't know." Chibi-Usa shrugged, "We managed it somehow though."  
  
Ami shook her head, then reached for the fanny pack belted around her waist, "Lucky for you, I am prepared for just a case."  
  
"Here we are." Makoto said as she pulled a mug full of Ovalitine from her bag, along with a couple of plastic cups. Usagi's attention was diverted from her dental savior to her hunger savior. It was then even further diverted when she saw something red and shiny by Makoto's shoe.  
  
Meanwhile, Ami had pulled two toothbrushes from her pack, "Which one do you want, blue or red?"  
  
"Blue!" Chibi-Usa exclaimed, dashing over the seats to reach it before Usagi could get her grubby little hands on it.  
  
But the odangoed-one hadn't even noticed the pretty, blue toothbrush.  
  
"Hey, my yo-yo!" Usagi celebrated, bending to retrieve it. The motion had Makoto throwing her Ovaltine loaded hands up to keep from spilling, but the smaller odangoed-one's projectile flight to retrieve her toothbrush ruined the attempt. The Ovaltine slipped from Makoto's grasp and poured onto Rei's head.  
  
This time, when the priestess drove off the road, they stayed there.  
  
^_~ ^_~ ^_~ ^_~ ^_~  
  
The girls sat on the side of the road, each holding a cup of leftover Ovaltine as they watched their mini-van being towed away. Well - technically, Rei was holding a cup of Ovalitine that she was ringing out of her hair, but that is just being nit-picky now, isn't it?  
  
"Well, we're stuck here until the man with the tow truck gets word to a taxi." Ami sighed, wiping some chocolate mess from her map book.  
  
"Yeah, we were real lucky he drove by when he did." Minako sniffled into her kleenex.  
  
"Yeah, real lucky." Rei muttered, grimacing as she pulled her sticky top away from her just-as-sticky skin.  
  
"At least we have Ovaltine." Makoto laughed bitterly, holding up her cup.  
  
"Yeah!" Chibi-Usa agreed, but her mouth had a ring of milky chocolate around it, so she was pretty much a happy camper.  
  
"If anyone wants anymore, I've got plenty." Rei replied sarcastically, squeezing more from her hair into the cup. Her answer was three heads shaking their heads vehemenently, insisting that they were fine.  
  
There was a short peace after that. At least, until Rei caught the whir of something red in the corner of her eye.  
  
Usagi was happily flicking her yo-yo out over and over again when a shadow suddenly fell over her. Usagi looked up, squinting at the sun-sillouheted form of the senshi of Mars.  
  
"Usagi." Rei spoke with a deliberately slow tone, "Run."  
  
Usagi gulped involunarily, this certainly didn't bode well for her, "Why?"  
  
"Because I'm going to kill you." Rei promised ominously.  
  
Usagi's mouth rounded as she said, "Oh," then she scrambled to her feet and dashed off at an inhuman speed down the road, Rei right on her heels. Ami stood to stop them, but Makoto and Minako quickly pulled her back down.  
  
"Don't Ami-chan." Makoto said.  
  
"But Rei is going to-"  
  
"Let her." Minako shrugged, tilting her tissue box upside down and sighing fitfully as she realized it was empty, "We're going to need something to keep us entertained for another half hour anyway."  
  
Chibi-Usa meanwhile, had happily appropriated Usagi's rich, chocolatey Ovalitne for herself.  
  
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  
  
Woo, good fun! Hope I didn't embarrass myself horribly. kamikaze_bunny_eater@yahoo.com  
  
^_~  
  
Cori!  
  
Written: May 24, 2001 


End file.
